One Out Of 4

The Saturday 1st Team lost to Bath 4ths in an epic encounter. Bath scored 290 for 5. In reply the Cowboys got 227 all out. Gibbo hit 88 and Iggy hit 42 in 18 balls.

The Saturday 2nd Team lost to Timsbury 2nds. We hit 113 all out and they hit the runs in 21.4 overs.

The Sunday Team beat Failand and Portbury. We hit 244 all out from 40 overs. RT2 hit 64 and ran his little brother out. They managed only 135 with Dean taking for wickets.

The Friendly Team lost to Bath Exiles. We hit 136 with Amir getting 38. The Exiles hit the runs in 25 overs without loss. One of their openers getting 118 and the other getting 9.

TTs repost on the Saturday 1sts match goes thus:

With a waft of weedkiller on the wind and the call of a pheasant from the southern slope of the valley, the Cowboys took to the field at Farmborough for their first home game of the season against Bath 4th XI. It was still cold for May, but mercifully the space between isobars was further apart than in previous weeks and having won the toss, bowling first was the preferred option.

With RT1 absent injured, Budge and the Landlord took the new ball against a solid opening pair, soon discovering that the pitch and batsmen were unforgiving of anything less then a good length and that perhaps Grover had marked the boundary too short. Budge took a while to adjust his radar but when he found the spot and the batsman sliced to gully, Grover stuck his hand up and plucked the ball from the air, in the now familiar manner of an excitable child urgently requesting the toilet.

A couple of overs later, the Landlord delivered a slow yorker that he and the batsman thought was a beamer and duly found himself apologising before the ball had reached its destination, which turned out to be the base of middle stump, much to their mutual surprise and respective jubilation and grief.

The next man in was an experienced old hand, renown for his ability to hit a good ball from outside off stump over square leg: This he then proceeded to do, his partner proving similarly adept at hitting hard and causing the Cowboys to hone their skills of ball retrieval from the undergrowth.

Lalith and SteveO tried their hand at breaking the partnership, but with little swing or turn to be had and the margin for error small, the ball still regularly found the boundary, until not long after a spilled chance at long-on, a mistimed drive off SteveO dropped short at long-off into the Landlord’s hands: 116-3.

Lalith then settled into his spell, making the highly accomplished batsmen work hard, unfortunate to remain wicketless. Ev replaced SteveO but couldn’t prevent the run rate from rising to above six a over, the crack of bat on ball mirrored by the sound of shotgun blasts from the top of the hill and as rabbits and pigeons scarpered, Cowboys retreated to the boundary. The partnership grew, Dunc tried his slow-slow-quick-quick-slow routine but couldn’t wrong-foot the batters and carrying an injury, Iggy was the last of the bowlers to get mauled for a couple of balls an over, having tied the batsman down for the remainder.

It wasn’t until the old hand on weary legs had made a century and his partner had passed fifty that the latter was run out by an impressive direct hit from Grover, who got in on the action again to catch the centurion off Iggy before the innings closed on 289-5.

Tea was a smörgåsbord of love provided by Iggy and Helen and threatened to divert attention from the remainder of the match. Unfortunately, the opposition didn’t fall into the trap of consuming so much home-baked bread and cake that they were unable to return to the field and after an indecently short interval the Cowboys set about scoring 7.25 an over to win.

Ev and Ange started off with positive intent and in great style, finding the boundary regularly as the Bath bowlers struggled with the loose ball. Their fifty partnership came up gratifyingly early, evidence for any who might have been in any doubt that there were runs in the pitch. Just before the pair had added a century together at a run a ball Ange was caught for 32.

Bath turned to flighted spin which Ben and Ev treated with respect when due, stroked and smashed when not. Before long they too had added a half century partnership and when Ben was bowled, the score had rattled along to 159-2 with Ev on 88. Without adding to this, the jug evasion panel was convened as Ev attempted a run too risky given the swift accuracy of the fielding side and was forced to curtail his combative and productive occupancy of the crease.

A second run out success for the opposition ended Dunc’s stay as a familiar Cowboy wobble ensued: After Grover nearly hit a ball for six he missed another and was bowled and when Lalith became the second in the innings to be bowled by a maiden with the score on 177-6 the outlook wasn’t rosy. However, Iggy brought fresh impetus to the attack, batting with a brutal assertiveness that suggested the possibility of scoring the remaining hundred runs by himself, along the way launching five sixes and causing the opposition to doubt their ability to defend the total.

At the other end, Joe fell to another run out, then Preash’s defences were breached as the score reached two hundred, but with eight wickets down and the Landlord at the wicket, Iggy still oozed confidence and began bludgeoning the ball harder and further. When his penultimate partner was given out LBW after edging the ball onto his foot, the Cowboys’ skipper still looked capable of hitting the remaining seventy runs from the last seven overs. Alas the bubble burst when he was caught just short of a remarkably fast half century and the Cowboys lost by 62 runs.

Ev’s opening innings earned him the Man of the Match vote and Grover’s outstretched hand won him the Cider Moment. Fines were heavily incurred.